Office #26, Wednesday

[chosehumanity]

It was a Wednesday, and Mitchell had mostly driven worries about people going around paralysing each other out of his mind. Instead, he had gone to his office, like he'd promised Kate, ordered a pizza, and turned on the television.

Just because he was a vampire didn't mean he needed to spend his days indoors in a coffin or something. ... Although he wouldn't put it past Herrick to start enforcing that one on a lark.

Anyway, BBC World had not yet lost its wonders, and the pizza was decent, so Mitchell was sated.

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[vanillajello]

"Hey," came a greeting from the door as Kate walked in, looking a little tired but in fairly good spirits.

It helped that her face was almost back to normal: the last of the fading blue showing through her make-up only made her skintone seem a little colder than it really was.

[chosehumanity]

"Kate," Mitchell greeted, with a light grin, and held up a bag of crisps. "Walkers?"

He'd brought a few boxes. Never knew when you had to placate George.

[vanillajello]

Kate draped her leather jacket over the back of a chair and sat down, holding out her hand for the bag with a light grin of her own. "Gimme."

She glanced at the TV. "Anything interesting in the world today?"

[chosehumanity]

"Well. Apparently the post? Wants to go on strike," Mitchell said, with the kind of mirth and enjoyment you would usually expect to get about talking of one's favourite band or movie. He pushed the bag at her. "And Cameron and Brown are having this massive row about it."

[vanillajello]

"You know, you could've just said no," Kate snorted. "Dork." Even the chips couldn't save him from the name-calling.

"Who's Cameron and Brown?"

[chosehumanity]

He shot her an affronted look. "Gordon Brown runs this place you may have heard of," he said, "Drifting somewhere between the Atlantic and the North Sea. David Cameron is his arch nemesis. What do they teach you children these days?"

[vanillajello]

"Color inside the lines and one plus one is two," she replied cheerfully. "Oh, and never ever have sex." A thoughtful pause. "I think that covers it."

[chosehumanity]

"Such a waste," he said, with a theatrical sigh, and upped the volume so she could clearly hear one man accuse the other of lacking courage and leadership.

Ah, political catfights.

[vanillajello]

"...And this is over the post?" she asked incredulously, with one eyebrow raised. "The people in the background sound really... into it as well."

[chosehumanity]

"I think they're smelling blood in the water," he commented, "That, or they're just fond of hair-pulling."

He slanted a look towards Kate. "So how are you?"

[vanillajello]

Kate inspected a chip for a moment before answering. "Okay, I guess. Could've slept better, but no nightmares. Mostly I'm trying not to think about it." She popped the chip in her mouth.

[chosehumanity]

"If anything, it's not going to happen again," Mitchell said, with possibly unfounded optimism. "...Which reminds me I promised you some coffee."

[vanillajello]

"Yeah, maybe next time it'll be something worse," she snorted in a knee-jerk reaction to too much optimism.

She smiled at the mention of coffee, though. "And since they've cut me off at the Perk, I'm holding you to that promise."

[chosehumanity]

"You're terrifying like that," he said, smirking, but got to his feet. "I'll be back in a bit, yeah."

With that, he exited the office in search of the closest coffee machine on the block.

[vanillajello]

Alone, Kate leaned back in her chair and looked around a bit. She'd been in more teachers' offices than she'd care to admit; it didn't hold her interest long, so she got out her cellphone and checked her messages.

[chosehumanity]

Eventually, the door opened, and Mitchell came in, clinging on to two coffee cups. Yeah, like he'd go for something fancy like a platter to carry them on, or something.

"Gossiping?" he said, conversationally, setting one cup down in front of her.

[vanillajello]

"They're doing metaHigh School Musical as the school play at my old school," she replied, putting the phone back in her pocket and picking up her cup. "My brother says it's lame and an insult to the theatrical arts."

[chosehumanity]

Mitchell pulled a face. "It's not even a film."

[vanillajello]

"Oh no, it's several. Each one better than the last."

Yes, Kate was kidding. She was known to like some fairly dumb films, but even she had some standards.

[chosehumanity]

"Get out of my office," Mitchell told her, and sat down. "I will not hear such blasphemy."

[vanillajello]

"What, you don't think Disney Channel's teen movies are the greatest cinematic masterpieces of all time?" she asked, feigning shock. "And they let you teach film? I'm appalled."

[chosehumanity]

"You should be, if you're into them at all," he said, sipping his coffee. "So do you want to talk about what happened, or watch more British politics in action?"

[vanillajello]

Kate sighed and looked down at her coffee cup. "I don't know. I don't think what I want to do and what I should do are exactly the same thing right now."

[chosehumanity]

Mitchell shrugged a shoulder. "That's hardly out of the ordinary, what with you being a human being and all," he said, "Just... go with what makes you happy right here."

[vanillajello]

"No such thing exists." She leaned back in her chair and sipped her coffee. "But out of these options I guess I'd rather choose politics. And that's the only time you'll ever hear me say that."

[chosehumanity]

"I'm sure there's a Mr. What rerun to be found as well," he offered, then paused. "...Or Dancing With The Stars. Ugh."

[vanillajello]

"Hey, Dancing With The Stars is prime mocking material," Kate argued. "But ooh, I could go for Mr. What." A pause, and then a stern look at Mitchell. "That doesn't need to be repeated outside this office."

[chosehumanity]

"Oh, so you're good with meta for High School Musical, and not Mr. What?" Mitchell asked her, scandalized.

[vanillajello]

"I have a reputation to uphold! I'm expected to like that teenybopper crap."

This, coming from a girl with occasional blue streaks in her hair and a general 'normal kids think I'm a freak' attitude, was probably a very unconvincing argument.